


12 Monkeys Theme Week - Day 5 - Letters From the Past

by pirategirljack



Category: 12 Monkeys (TV)
Genre: 12 Monkeys Theme Week
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-04-23
Updated: 2015-04-23
Packaged: 2018-03-25 10:57:56
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 871
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3807820
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/pirategirljack/pseuds/pirategirljack
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Jones finally opens her mail.</p>
            </blockquote>





	12 Monkeys Theme Week - Day 5 - Letters From the Past

The scavs would be through their defenses soon, and if Jones was to die, she wished it to be on her own terms. And so she retreated to her own chambers, locked all the doors between the hall and her office, and opened her trunk. All that remained of her old life–all that remained of her whole world, and of the only few things she’d loved–was in this trunk. Hannah’s blanket, the one she’d brought her baby home from the hospital in. Pictures of everyone who had died around her. Her favorite books. Her parents’ wedding bands.

And an envelope she’d never opened.

It was one of those large ones, big enough for a thick folder or a moderate stack of papers, and she’d gotten it only days before she’d had to leave her home in 2017–in the middle of the apocalypse. It had no return address, but she recognized the handwriting as Dr Railly’s. She’d told them to go, to forget about her. She didn’t want to know what happened to them–or what was to happen to her. And then this letter had arrived.

Now, what did it matter? They had hours left, at most, and then time would be someone else’s daily headache.

She opened the envelope.

The first page was a note from Dr Railly, saying she knew Jones had asked not to be told anything, but that their adventures since last they spoke had changed her opinion of the subject and she now knew that they all needed to share as much information as they had.

Jones humphed, and it a cigarette. She put aside the letter.

Under was another letter, this one in Mr Cole’s atrocious and little-used scrawl. This one was much longer, made of sections written in different pens on different days, some neater than others, one smeared with what looked like drops of blood and another with a ring of brown coffee stains. These pages told of everything they’d faced, every lead they’d followed and all of their outcomes, every clue they’d found and all the rumors and whispers they’d heard. They started out quick and formal, file pages, and soon became longer, more personal. She was reading Cole’s own diary of their mission.

Jones covered her mouth and choked back a sob she didn’t know was coming until it broke through.

“Oh, Mr Cole. I should have opened this much sooner,” she said into the silence of her rooms.

It was almost too much, this journal. It was so very him, and it made her heart ache that all these trials he and Dr Railly had faced, they had faced them because she sent him back. She heard his voice in the sloppy, hasty handwriting, and it hurt that she would never see her friend return.

She almost put the whole thing away, but instead, she lit another cigarette and turned the page.

Behind the journal was a folded map with fifteen points precisely marked–all within a day’s walk, or a day’s drive on the roads, from this very location. And in small, precise script–Dr Railly’s again–beside each, a note on what was there: “results of our research on the Army”, “everything we know about Jonathan Gibbons”, “Peters’s journal and various notes on virus creation”, “The Pale Men”, “Everything Jennifer has told us about the Daughters, and some other things”…

They’d left her caches of information. They had no way of getting them to her now, when they mattered, since Mr Cole was severed from the machine, but they set up hidden libraries she could access in her own time.

Libraries that could still exist.

Jones clambered to her feet as quickly as her abused bones would allow, and went to find Mr Whitley with the map clutched in her hand. Time had not run out. They had new details they hadn’t had before.

“Mr Whitley! Evacuate the base, leave anything you can’t pack quickly! We have somewhere to go!”

“What are you taking about?” His hands were bandaged, but he was cleaning and checking his gun anyway. Some blood showed through.

Jones waved the map in Mr Whitley’s face and slapped at it with the hand holding the cigarette, then brushed the ashes off. “It’s Mr Cole and Dr Railly! They’ve saved us.”

“And where was this a day ago? A month ago?”

“Unavailable. But this map represents more hope than we have had since Mr Cole left for 1987. We’re going. Evacuate. Now!”

Mr Whitley hesitated just a moment longer, eyeing her the way he did when he was questioning her sanity–she had seen that look many times since she convinced him to leave Spearhead with her–while she waved her hands at the scientists and soldiers, snapping instructions. But he decided, again, blessedly, that she was sane enough to follow.

“You heard the woman,” he said. “Move!”

Jones paused long enough to meet his eyes and smiled, just a little, hoping he could read all the things she could not tell him–and there were so many things. He returned her mile, just the tiniest bit, and nodded.

Jones wheeled about to pack her own things. They had a new mission.

**Author's Note:**

> This was originally part of the 12 Monkeys Theme Week Event:  
> http://samiholloway.tumblr.com/post/116027009927/12-monkeys-theme-week-day-5-finale-wishlist-3
> 
> It's now sort of absorbed into After The End, and basically acts as part of that, with some stuff (like Cassie) being missing because I hadn't seen the finale yet when I wrote it.


End file.
